Product Description

Nineteen sixty-two—it’s been called “the end of innocence,” as America witnessed the Cuban Missile Crisis and the following year saw the Kennedy assassination and the early stirrings of Vietnam.

In baseball, 1962 was a thrilling season. Five years prior the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants had migrated west to Los Angeles and San Francisco, respectively, leaving New York to the Yankees. In 1962, those same Giants and Dodgers faced off to see who would advance to the World Series. Waiting to do battle were the Yankees, who were also battling for allegiance in New York with the Mets’ debut. The old Subway Series had gone cross-country.

Just as it was the end of innocence, it was an end of an era for the Yankees. Winners of eleven World Series titles in twenty years, they would go fifteen years— a record for the modern-era Bombers at the time—until their next championship. They appeared in the next two World Series, but by the end of the decade it was those upstart Mets amazin’ fans. The Dodgers would break through the following year and again in 1965 while the Giants—convinced they’d be back many times— have yet to win a title on the West Coast. Mickey Mantle and Whitey Ford, Willie Mays and Willie McCovey, Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale, Casey Stengel. Steven Travers details Hollywood’s adoration of the Dodgers, San Francisco’s battle between inferiority and superiority, and New York, rulers of sport and society, experiencing the beginnings of a changing of the guard. Three cities, five teams, and one great year are all here in A Tale of Three Cities.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #100508 in Books
• Published on: 2009-04-30
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 274 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9781597974318
• BUY WITH CONFIDENCE, Over one million books sold! 98% Positive feedback. Compare our books, prices and service to the competition. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed
• Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.

About the Author
Steven Travers is the author of multiple sports books, including Barry Bonds: Baseball’s Superman and five books in the Triumph/Random House Essentialsports team series. Formerly a columnist for StreetZebra magazine and the San Francisco Examiner, he lives in California.

Customer Reviews

A Season to Remember
Steven Travers captures the essence of the 1962 season in Major League baseball, while painting a vivid picture of the changes taking place in American society. His work made for a compelling, if slightly uneven, saga.

The result is still a powerful perspective of the first "coast to coast" thrill ride in baseball history, as the transplanted Dodgers and Giants battled it out in epic fashion for the NL pennant, while the perennial champion New York Yankees would begin their gradual fade from Dynasty to also ran; supplanted at decade's end by the Amazin' Mets.

But still, the Yanks reigned supreme in '62 (barely), taking another World Series title against a solid San Fransico Giants team. It would prove to be their last championship for fifteen years, signaling a temporary end to Yankee supremacy.

The country itself was undergoing a metamorphisis, although we didn't realize it at the time; but the Cuban Missle Crisis was unfolding, the Civil Rights Movement was starting to heat up; along with Vietnam; and in a little over a year, President Kennedy would be assasinated.

The country experienced a great deal of turmoil during the '60s, and 1962 seemed to be the year the fuse was lit; the resulting "explosion" would change the fabric of American society, forever.

For the game of baseball, it signaled the beginning to a new era, where the National League style of play would reign supreme for three decades. But nothing lasts forever; nowadays the American League wins (or ties) every All-Star game, the country itself has become ObamaNation, and it seems like everyone in the world is hooked on Twitter.

This book is a well-written and bold endeavor; possibly attempting to take on more than it could handle, but nevertheless, a very worthy effort.

Where's the editor?
On the face, this book looks like a delightful trip back to the halcyon days of the National Pastime. It was an era of rapid change, a time when the greats of the Golden Age of the '50s were ending their careers and the young upstarts who would dominate the '60s were first showing their stuff. Expansion had introduced major league baseball to a New Generation of Americans. Latin and African-American players were beginning to show a dominance that exists to this day.

Sadly, Travers falls well short of these expectations.

The book describes itself as the story of three cities. But New York, the Center of the Baseball Universe for five decades, receives short shrift, even with the unbelievably inept New York Mets and the still dominant Yankees offering plenty of material.

He also presents a disturbingly biased attitude towards the Dodger-Giant rivalry. His disdain for the Giants, and anything associated with the city of San Francisco, is blatant and distracts from the story of an incredible pennant race.

However, the most disturbing thing is the haphazard, careless and amateurish editing throughout the book. Anecdotes are introduced, but left unfinished; other incidents are reported twice, with different facts; and some events (especially in recounting the World Series) are told in confusing, random order. There are even grammar and spelling errors that most 6th graders should catch.

1962 was a marvelous year for all of baseball (even though, as a Dodger fan, I found the conclusion depressing), but this book only manages to leave a bad taste in your mouth.

A Tale of Disappointment
Each baseball season has the potential to be special and 1962 was no different. It was the year before JFK's assassination. It was the last Yankees World Championship for their old dynasty and the first potential post season meeting between bitter rivals since the move of the Dodgers and Giants to the west coast in 1958. And indeed elements of these points are in the book. But the author's treatment of the Dodgers, Giants and Yankees is not even handed nor even proportionate to their accomplishments that year. The Dodgers are lionized as the model franchise and L.A. as the city of the future. The Giants and the city of San Francisco are thoroughly trashed and the Yankees are only mentioned as an afterthought. As it happens, the Giants beat out the Dodgers in a three game playoff to win the NL flag and the Yankees were World Champs that year by beating the Giants. Also regretably, the author inserts his religious and political views--totally inappropriate for a book on baseball. This book could have been much more. Very disappointing.